


in time

by worry



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, M/M, Warning: Camille Belcourt, that's a tag now because she is horrible
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-10 18:16:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8927602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/worry/pseuds/worry
Summary: “You’re getting too soft,” says Camille. She pulls her hand out of the wound and he gasps; he does not flinch, because again: the comforting feeling of danger, and being broken. It’s all broken. Camille loves to break.He deserves it. You cannot be soft when you’re a vampire. Raphael isn’t  soft. Edges hard, like a statue. Like something he can never be. Raphael is sharp, his life fashioned into a razor blade. He worked so hard to get here, for this position, and now he’s—Soft.Camille licks her fingers and walks away.(Or: Raphael, and being soft, and losing his strength.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING: abuse, body horror, self harm, implied sexual abuse/rape. I wrote this during a Bad Mental Episode, so. Be safe.

III.

"You thought you'd get away with it, didn't you?"

Camille's fingernails on his shoulder are sharp, but: he already has a wound here. He already has open skin. Camille's sharp nails mean  _nothing._ Also: Camille’s sharp nails mean everything, everything in the world that has ever _rotted_. It reeks of familiarity. Hands and open shoulders. It’s a mix-up, this time; if someone is not hurting, then something is broken. If Raphael is hurting, then something is broken. If Raphael is not hurting, then something is broken. Broken. Broken. Broken. Like—

“No,” he admits. “You can do whatever you want. He was never a part of this, and you know it.”

“But he was so _fun_ ,” Camille tells him, and digs a finger into the sour wound of the knife. It should have healed, by now.

Raphael does not flinch. It’s too dangerous.

“Your idea of fun is strange.”

Camille hisses at him. Inside of his shoulder are her claws, her rotten claws. Curling. Raphael does not flinch.

“You’re getting too soft,” says Camille. She pulls her hand out and he gasps; he does not flinch, because again: the comforting feeling of danger, and being broken. It’s all broken. Camille loves to break.

He deserves it. You cannot be soft when you’re a vampire. Raphael isn’t _soft_. Edges hard, like a statue. Like something he can never be. Raphael is sharp, his life fashioned into a razor blade. He worked _so hard_ to get here, for this position, and now he’s—

Soft.

Camille licks her fingers and walks away.

_XIII._

_The cross around his neck burns even harder when Camille comes back, right out of the coffin. By Simon’s hand. Simon’s hand, their fingers that once laced together pulled apart, by a coffin. By something that should be buried, like their love._

_So: “Kill them,” he says, but his heart was cut from him, right through sick ribs, long ago. He has never been soft. The world is never soft. The world, like Raphael, is hard-surfaced. These things happen._

_His hand burns, too. He deserves it. Raphael deserves all of the hurting. Everything he has ever suffered around, coming back like a ghost._

_The Shadowhunters could have killed them, with the sunlight._

_The Shadowhunters could have killed him. He would have deserved it. He isn’t soft. He was, once, but: that time is dead now. Fossilized. Now Raphael is going to harden, shed softness like a snakeskin._

_Goodbye._

_(He holds his hand out into the path of sunlight, again, when the clan can’t see him, but—)_

_(The cross around his neck burns still. His hand in the sunlight burns still.)_

_(This is the only way to make things truly right.)_

V.

One would view the accelerated healing of a vampire as a gift. In actuality, however, it is a curse.

Camille holds the knife to his throat; it is a very familiar knife. In some past life, Raphael held it to Simon’s neck. It digs _deep_ , slices him open like something dead being examined. On second thought: he _is_ something dead being examined. Blood spills from his neck with a sound that is almost as disgusting as he is – a low, choking noise.

Raphael only imagines holy water as she slides two fingers into the wound, opening it up to a gash, and – sticks her tongue right into it, cold and sharp. Teeth scraping at the strings. Holy water burning her. Sunlight burning her. The cross around his neck burning her.

 _How many others_ , he thinks, and stops himself. He cannot be soft. Camille can widen him and violate him but softness is something that he just

can’t

hold.

In his hands, nailed to the wall, some sick idea of punishment. One day—

One day, he’ll be able to stop it all.

(He deserves this.)

One day, Camille will be gone.

(He deserves this.)

He can wait. He is very good at waiting, he is too familiar with time.

(He deserves this.)

He’ll need evidence, of course, to stop her, but—

(He deserves thi—)

VI.

It takes him only six seconds to put his jacket on, when he senses Simon’s presence. All of the red has washed away, off of his skin, so: that’s something, that’s _something_ , that’s something he can use to put himself together long enough to keep Simon _out_. Run. Run. _Run_. Run because I can’t, because the only thing I can do is keep you away. Raphael’s actions some mask of good and softness. But. He pretends, of course, to be hard. Bares his teeth. _Get out of here and don’t come back._

VII.

“If I didn’t know you, I’d say you’re in love,” she says, and smiles a smile that makes her look abhorrently human.

And – love. Love is being soft, love is _vulnerability_. Vulnerability like someone cutting your neck open, vulnerability like someone ruining you, vulnerability like bruises that heal in instants. Vulnerability like being broken. He can be littered with open wounds at her hands, and he will never be soft, or in love. Just vulnerable, just – terrified.

“You’re out of your mind,” he tells her, and swallows, blood-stained cross on him burning.

“I know he was here,” Camille tells him. “I know you’re getting softer. One day,” she says, and with the speed of a monster, twists his hand into an inhuman position, “you’re going to shatter.”

Irony. His hand like something inhuman, and Raphael shattering.

It snaps back eight minutes later, perfectly normal; Camille’s hands only ghosting in his memory.

VIII.

Simon dies.

That is only the beginning.

He finds Simon’s body covered in blood, on the slick marble floor of the Hotel, neck folded right open like—

Anyways. He cleans Simon up with the strangeness of intimacy, treats him the way you are not ever supposed to treat a dead body: with _kindness_.

 _Oh,_ he thinks, _maybe she’s right. Maybe I am too soft._

_It doesn’t matter._

IX.

Camille will never be able to hurt again. The vampires attack her. The cross around his neck, still blood-stained, burns. Now: he has power. Now: he’s not sure what to do with it. Now: he’s in control, body in the sky with a crown on his head. Amen.

Simon rises from the dead, Rises, and drinks the blood that Raphael gives him. That is only the beginning.

XII.

“Stick around,” he says, and Simon: does. Raphael knows that he would rather be with Clary Fairchild, anywhere else that is not _here_ , false-home. But. Simon stays with him, and Raphael grows even more fragile.

“There’s something I want to teach you,” he tells Simon, and Simon: winces, like Raphael hurt him. Maybe Raphael hurt him. Maybe Raphael isn’t soft.

“What is it?” asks Simon, still uncomfortable.

“Close your eyes.”

“I don’t want to.”

“I understand.”

Simon closes his eyes. The light in the room slowly fades with the flutter of it.

“What am I doing? I—“

“Focus on me,” Raphael says lowly, “I’m going to leave the room, go somewhere, and you’re going to find me.”

“I get that you want me to control my senses, or whatever,” Simon says, “but what’s the point?”

“You need to be connected to me, in tune with me,” Raphael says, voice quiet. “It will help you in training, in battle, and if you’re ever in danger.”

“Yeah, because you’re going to save my life a third time, totally.”

Raphael glares at him. Simon, with his eyes closed, can still feel it.

(Simon finds him eventually, gives in eventually.)

(Camille was right, about the breaking. About the love.)

0.

Simon holds his hand, once. Never again.

Raphael says I love you, once. Never again.

They are happy. For a while. The ending to this story is too predictable.

_XIV._

_It takes longer for his hand to heal than it should. Sometimes he feels that connection, and sometimes he feels Camille, waiting with her teeth and her claws. Sometimes he feels Simon holding him._

_It doesn’t matter._

_The cross around his neck is no longer blood-stained. He is no longer soft._

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please, please, please tell me what u think.


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